Events Archive
Peek into life in America at cultural center in Omdurman
In the heart of Sudan’s intellectual capital, Omdurman, there is now a place where students, academics, and others can go to learn about popular American culture. The place is called Abdelkarim Merghani Cultural Center.
In recent months, the U.S. Embassy’s Public Affairs Section in Khartoum has made the short drive across the White Nile to visit the center and to deliver up to a dozen different periodicals, including The New Yorker, National Geographic, Sports Illustrated, Time, Newsweek, and Popular Mechanics. This is an informal arrangement between the Embassy and the cultural center’s directors, but the benefits to library users are great. Magazines such as these that are published in the United States are often impossible to find on Sudan’s magazine stands.
The cultural center’s bilingual (Arabic-English) library also boasts an audio-visual library, and it is now possible for users to research information about U.S. business, education, government, media, and culture using the InfoUSA Compact Disc that was developed by the Bureau of International Information Programs at the U.S. Department of State.
The cultural center, which opened its doors in May 1998, has the following objectives: dissemination of culture, knowledge and scientific information. It accomplishes these by holding fairs, symposia, and lectures on the arts, folklore, and culture. Last February, the center hosted a program on Black History Month organized by the U.S. Embassy’s Public Affairs Section.